This is a really good way of putting it. The "someone else's rules" are pretty important when you're starting out with little knowledge of nutrition and biochemistry... if you've been doing what Everyone Knows, eating low fat and low cal and HeartHealthyWholeGrains. Follow those rules long enough to learn why the old way didn't work. Then, go through the stages, try some new foods, and be brutally honest with yourself about what you can and can't handle.

Success will come to those who are honest with themselves and embrace those things which one can handle. My treats are peanut butter, chocolate based LC treats, and I enjoy starchy veggies without any temptation to go overboard. But this is highly subjective.

I can also handle portion control via situation, I guess you could call it. Being at a restaurant is a good example. I often have to choose something higher carb to stay gluten-free, and it doesn't derail me. Sure, it's not ideal. I might feel a bit crappy the next day, gain water weight, and be more hungry/cravy than normal. This is a rare treat, though, and keep in mind that I've been at a healthy weight for 14 years now. You'll only get away with this if your kitchen and your day-to-day lifestyle is solidly entrenched with LC choices. If you're white-knuckling it all the time, those "treats" and "just this once" are going to happen all the time, until you just give up because it "doesn't work."

Exactly, Kristine. I think that's what derails so many people. It derailed me with dried fruit, two winters ago, and I regained 12 of 20 hard lost pounds, at that point.

But it's not the WOE that didn't work, it was ME, and it's that piece that is so hard to handle, I think. If one's addiction to the carby stuff is strong enough, it will help us make all sorts of excuses for why we have to eat off plan, over and over.

For me, it's WAY easier just not to do it, or to plan it out way ahead, with specific parameters that are tightly woven.

Last fall, when visiting Daughter and her family in Italy, I had planned that I could have gelato three times in the three weeks. Once was to be when Husband and I took a two night mini vacation on the coast, once was when we went to Lago di Garda, and I had one "free" one, that I spent on Halloween.

The gelati had to be small servings, too, and I had to go near zero carb for the rest of the day.

Making even "cheats" be strict, works best for me.

I have "cheated" exactly once this past year, on Thanksgiving, at my daughter-in-law's house. I had some gluten free pie for dessert. I've been doing this long enough that I know one dessert at someone's house will not derail me especially since these kinds of events are rare in my life. When I first started out I never had a dessert because it was important for me to follow the rules and not risk derailing the whole process. I've been doing this for a long time, over 10 years. Once I gained back 20 pounds because I stopped paying as much attention, allowed myself too many off plan foods. Then I got back on the wagon and lost the 20 I gained and then lost 20 more. I know what works for me and what doesn't and stick with that. I am thin; I am healthy; I enjoy my food; I don't feel deprived. Pretty good for a once fat sick post menopausal woman.

Also, another way to look at it: from the perspective of my previous low fat life, I was much more deprived then.

I had watery low fat blue cheese dressing on those endless boring salads without meat or cheese. I had chicken breast instead of steak, pasta instead of protein, bread but no butter. Yes, I had all the rice cakes a girl could want, but no guacamole, olives, or bacon!

I'm far less deprived now.

Only you can know if cheat days will derail your progress or not. I know for myself I cannot have very many or it derails me to the point where it is next to impossible to stay on plan. I will never be able to eat my carby comfort food because the weight gain is unacceptable to my health and well being.

no cos i am scared where it will lead!

As Jean alluded, though, at the beginning, it's important to just not cheat, because NOBODY knows how much of a hold carbs have on them at that point.

For a whole lot of us, a couple months into the program, when everything seems to be going along well, we suddenly get pushed, hard, to eat carbs.

Our addiction tells us the way we're eating is too dreary, too boring. Or that the (fill in the blank cause) stress we're under means we NEED some comfort food. Anything that will work, to get us back in the pit of addiction.

Telling oneself that cheating is NOT ALLOWED, period, for at least the first year is a really good idea. And then, even then, it's important to keep monitoring ourselves. So many of us (me, too) have lost and gained, lost and gained, our entire lives. The only way to stop that is to stop fooling ourselves.

yup. hence my post!

ps. i just succeeded in not giving into my sugar addiction in the form of an atkins - which i was only eating cos i was told they were acceptable in induction in quantities of 2 a day - bar for 24 hours. i knew i could do it. i know i can do whatever i choose to do.

i feel incredibly impressed

first day no chocolate for 28 years.

Carol, that is excellent! Give yourself a great big WOOHOO!

We are definitely all different. I've been eating LC for 10 months, and trust me, up until recently, I did not cheat, not even a bite. I made it through the holidays, birthdays, etc. without so much as trying the things I cooked for my family. The important thing for me personally was that for the first time in my life, it didn't feel like a huge sacrifice to eschew sugar, bread, potatoes, etc. I no longer want them.

How do I know? I encountered a pretty serious stall in March after 7 months of very regular losing. I added exercise. I adjusted my macros, mostly added fat, increased my calories a bit because they were too low. The scale didn't budge. It actually started to go up a bit and I was beyond panicked. I agonized and finally decided to have a carb day. I did not call it a "cheat day" because it was planned and designed to shake things up in my body. Anyway, the point is, for me, I know I turned a corner when, on that carb day, I couldn't think of anything carb-laden that I really wanted. I didn't crave anything. And on that day last week that I did actually eat carbs, I didn't enjoy it. I couldn't wait to go back to eating my regular LC way.

(For the record, I ate carbs for one day. Gained 3 pounds. Went back to LC and went up another pound the next day. OMG! But then I lost it and 4 more in a week. Fingers crossed it keeps coming off.)

DH, for example, decided to join me on LC to lose 30 pounds, which he lost in less than 2 months. (Sigh. Men.) But even now he still craves sugar, and he gives in to it more than I think he should. But his weight is stable and he usually snacks on turkey, cheese, almonds, LC veggies, eggs, etc. I thought he would lose the cravings like I did but he's still got it bad. For him, I think there is an emotional connection to sugar which I no longer have...thank goodness.

We are both eating much better than we used to and he eats far less garbage nowadays. When I used to eat sugar, it was like, the more I ate, the more I wanted. It was a very physical addiction for me. I am very thankful that I no longer want it. Hopefully it stays that way. Carol, I'm betting that it will get easier for you, too, but MickiSue makes a good point. Every one of has had issues with carbs at one point or another, and it's up to each of us to figure out the best way to deal with them from now on. Too much fruit can be a trigger. A taste of cake can set us back, etc. I don't dare think that I can eat carbs on a regular basis and think I won't slip back into eating too many like I used to...and gain all my weight back. I can never go back to that. Luckily, as Werebear said, I feel much less deprived eating this way than I ever did on any other plan designed for weight loss. But, I'm not on a "diet." I have a new way of life and I feel certain I will never go back.

Hang in there. You will figure out what works for you and it may take some time before you feel mentally prepared to try things. That's how it was for me. It was excruciating to eat carbs last week but luckily I've been eating LC long enough that it didn't suck me back in. Chocolate, hopefully, will become a distant memory for you. In the meantime, congratulate yourself on the positive steps you're taking.

thanks guys, that is really nice. two supportive posts. me like!

you know, it very much an emotional family thing for me. only then i get physically addicted too. cos when i read 'hopefully chocolate will be a thing of the past for you'i felt so so so sad. really bereft. like it was my whole family background and love that was being taken from me. i had a really tearful reaction. plus, it is my business. you know i make home made truffles and have a shop? my own shop ? a chocolate shop? well i am not about to end up homeless cos of atkins! but, i could have tasters. i jut dont know who i could trust with a sensor like mine. anyhow... bla bla bla. not an excuse. i am doing this. its just making me so unhappy. i dont want a lie without chocolate. it my whole life.

and yet here i am doing it! A MASSIVE emotional pull.
i am immensely proud of no chocolate atkins bars yesterday and none today so far. i have been to the fridge many times but not for them.

it is due to support like ths that i can do it and that is why i can do it.

onwards and upwards

ps. if i stalled THEN ate carbs and put on 4 pounds i would really feel desperate. i mean, desperate... i remember once, years ago, eating nothing for three days, just water and lemon juice and i lost no weight and i felt desperate. but then you say it did work cos you lost all the 4 plus more. so that strategy actually worked? i will remember that when i am stalled and desperate. the only carb i want is sugar.

love, carol

Believe me, I totally get the emotional thing. For our family, and I'm sure most families, food was the central focus of family celebrations and holidays. Everyone raves about my baked bean casserole, the chocolate pudding-cream cheese layered dessert, my lasagna, and my enchiladas. It took quite a while for me to get past the sadness that settled in when I thought about how different it would be, to not feel that "joy" about food. The good thing is that it's passed. I got through the holidays, my grandson's first birthday, etc., and realized it was about being with the ones I love. I was able to enjoy my turkey leg and deviled eggs and not feel like I was missing out because I didn't have a brownie or mashed potatoes.

As far as my cheat day, I was ABSOLUTELY terrified when the scale went up that much, and then, after a day back on LC, it went up more. I was so devastated and panicked, I can't even tell you. Thank goodness everything started to come back off. I will definitely have to remember that, IF I do it again. I'll have to be very emotionally prepared for that. I'm hoping I won't have to.

You'll get there. What you feel is very normal. But it does get better. And you're doing a great thing! Keep up the good work!

great post , thank you

Carol, I was the baker. The homemade bread, the multiple kinds of cookies at Christmas, the "what kind of cake do you want for your birthday" and no request was too outrageous baker.

And then, I read enough evidence against grains that I went cold turkey. And I remember seeing a Brueggers Bagel shop and thinking about how I used to stop in there and get a sandwich after I got my hair done, and that was in my past.

A friend said, "You can eat bread, once in a while." But I knew that if I did, it'd be the end of my low carb, no grains life: I would find more and more reasons to have it once in a while.

I found a recipe for Italian Christmas cookies made with almond flour, and that's now the only one I make.

I made a low carb pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving, last year. And you know, I could eat it. My DIL who's gluten sensitive could eat it. And my brother, who had flown from northern California for Thanksgiving, and was a newly diagnosed T2D, could eat it.

I don't know the answer for you. But I do know that you can find it, because you are approaching this WOE with thoughtfulness and the willingness to be wrong.

I was a wellness coach for 14 years, and still do some. BOY, did I ever have to be willing to be wrong, when I went low carb!